Finally we had some lake effect rain after our long drought and Snake Hill Creek is running again!

After a long hot dry summer we finally got some rain. Which means the cold season shiitakes are beginning to pop!

Cabbage harvest with Miss Maya!

Picking midseason cabbage today and laying up some sauerkraut! This is from our second season winter compost bed. Time to start our fall cabbage plants

White and Norway spruce vinegars with our honey

Adding crystallized honey and apple scrap vinegar to the jar

Unchopped spruce tips

Norway spruce, Picea abies

Setting up the next year's batch of spruce tip balsamic vinegar. This was such a success that I am making larger batches this year. We used Norway and white spruce tips as well as our homemade apple scrap vinegar as well as honey from our bees. Now to put it in a cabinet and shake it every so often

Snake Hill Creek is pretty tame today. Love these little waterfalls.

Happy International Bee Day! We just caught a swarm! These swarmed from our Hobbit hive.

We'll transfer these bees to the Sunflower hive once they get established

Garter snake in grass

Snake in the woods near the grapevine

Comfrey is in bloom again

Many snakes out today around our new food forest area. Snake Hill Permaculture bringing all the snakes to the garden. They especially love to hide near the comfreys.

Northern paper wasp

Northern paper wasp, Polistes fuscatus, building a nest under one of the honeyberry bushes. Luckily this one isn't fruiting this year so we'll just keep our distance from each other. Eat the caterpillars friend!

Baiting the sunflower hive

Sunflower hive installed and strapped down

Last hive going out for the season. This is our sunflower hive, it is baited and strapped down. If you see a bee let them know we have vacancy!

Northern green frog

Frogs are waking up again. Here's a Northern green frog, Lithobates clamitans, that is wandering around the nursery.

First fiddleheads from the ostrich fern, Matteuccia struthiopteris. We are reintroducing these to our woodland habitat to combat erosion and to add more diversity as well as a future food source.

Serviceberry, Amelanchier canadensis, is in bloom now. A very early bloomer, this is a great bee fodder and one of the earliest producing berries in June. That is, if you can wrest any from the birds! Fair Share

Today we planted out a mulberry hedge and some Japanese and Chinese Szechuan peppers by the old horse fence. I'm hoping the incredible thorns of the Szechuan pepper helps deter the deer who often follow the fence line

It's a Layens hive, they are insulated and use a top bar approach

Shiitakes in the dehydrator

Cutting mushrooms from the log

A nice little harvest

First flush of shiitakes are going in the dehydrator! Hopefully we get thunderstorms this weekend and have another round as many of the logs haven't flushed yet, the extra snow slowed everything down. These are on sugar maple logs from a large fallen branch off our Grandmother tree

Attaching wax strips using an old laptop charger

Drawn out comb from last season

Time to start fishing for bees!

We're in a better position this year because we now have drawn out comb from last year. I put one in each swarm trap. All the other frames just have strips of wax so the scouts can measure the cavity easier. This trap is going to one of the large shagbark hickories

Dream Rabbit painting

Mandrake side with frames

Backside mushrooms

Dream Rabbit hive is secured and baited for a new swarm. If you see any bees let them know we have space available at Snake Hill Permaculture!

Goumi bushes

Cherry and apple trees

Pawpaws by Pawpaw Creek

Jujubes

Busy planting our bareroot trees an bushes. Today we put in more jujubes, cherry, apple and pawpaw trees. We also added more goumi bushes into the system. I also planted out over 120 black currants an jostaberries from cuttings. Lots of mud!

Shiitake flush

We had a bunch of thunderstorms roll through two days ago and now we have a big shiitake flush in our mushroom garden! We inoculated these on red maple. More rain coming overnight

One year old black currant

We planted out over 120 black and pink currant cuttings and some jostaberry today! Here is one of our black currants that is just starting to break dormancy from last year.

Fuki

Fuki is starting to come up down by pawpaw creek.

White fig sapling

Chicago and white fig saplings

American plum with Nanking cherry guild

It's tree planting season! We are starting to get in all of our orders we put in this winter and we seem to be planting everyday. Today we planted out two white figs, two hardy Chicago figs and two American plums. We planted the plums near Nanking cherries, they should make a good beginning guild

Leveled hive

Metal tie wrap holding down hive stand

Ukrainian folk art beehive

Babushka taking down a Russian drone with a jar of pickles

New Layens hive set up in the apiary today. Ukrainian hive is leveled, baited, strapped down and metal tie wrapped to the iron stakes (Lake Erie winds and some bear protection). Hoping for a new swarm to make their home here this spring.

We still have two more hives to set up over the next month

Maple syrup through the season

It's fascinating how the syrup's color changes over the season. Not only the color but the taste as well, in the beginning the light color is more like honey and later it develops the rich maple taste

The ground has finally thawed enough so it's spring tree planting season. Yesterday we planted out four additional pawpaws and today we are planting eastern redbuds. We've been using homemade charcoal as the only amendment in the soil, it seems to improve the trees vigor for sure. Native plants win!

A mad dash right before the thunderstorm!

Red maple is in bloom now and it's a mad dash to gather the pollen to begin the spring flow season. Of course, we'll probably get more snow, but it's good to see the girls foraging again.

Acer rubrum in bloom

The red maples (Acer rubrum) are beginning to bloom in the 70 degree weather so that's the end of maple syrup season. I still have about 18 gallons to boil down, but I'm glad that the bees now have a nectar and pollen source

This is an awesome project! We are planting out more American persimmons this year---however on a much smaller scale

Honeybees on the compost pile

The honeybees are working on the compost pile. They seem to especially like used coffee grounds? Maybe they need a little pickup after the harsh winter 🤔